


Drifting Out at Sea

by Abyssinia



Category: Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-10-02
Updated: 2008-10-01
Packaged: 2017-10-02 23:52:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 10
Words: 11,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Abyssinia/pseuds/Abyssinia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The hardest part about the apocalypse isn't losing Earth. The hardest part is holding everything together afterwards.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written for 20008 Apocalypse_Kree prompt: "184. Gen OR John/Rodney AND/OR Sam/Jack. Earth has been destroyed/decimated and evacuated. Some (a lot?) of the survivors made it to Atlantis. Who lived and who died? Atlantis 10 years later."  
> Betaed by Aurora Novarum

**October 18, 2007 (3 ASY (Atlantis Standard Years))**

Their first warning is when Vala vanishes. One minute Jackson is giving a briefing on his new theories on how to help the galaxy resist the Ori now that Adria has ascended, and the next minute Vala's chair is filled with a flash of white light and then nothing but air.

An hour later there are ten Ori ships closing in on the asteroid belt, Sam is with Siler and Lee fighting a hopeless battle with Merlin's phase-shifting device, and Jackson has disappeared. Cam finds him in an unused storage room near the archaeology labs, flat on his back. "Jackson, what are you doing?" he demands, slamming the door open. "If you haven't noticed, we've got an invasion on our hands. Could use your help."

"I am helping." Cam takes a step back at Jackson's snarl through gritted teeth. "I'm doing what I should have done long ago."

"Jackson?" Cam asks, cautious this time.

"They're not going to do anything," Jackson mutters, still not opening his eyes. "They're just going to sit there and watch while the Ori burn through this galaxy. But I can do something. And I'm not going to sit by anymore."

"Jackson..." He scares Cam when he gets like this, makes him realize just how much control he doesn't have over his own team. "You gonna regret this?"

"Probably. It doesn't matter." Jackson's voice is quieter, his breathing slower.

"Then c'mon out and help us."

"Mitchell? Go away." Cam looks at Jackson's unmoving form, knows there's nothing he can do short of carry him out of the room, and he isn't sure his back is up to that, so after a minute he closes the door and goes back to Reynolds, organizing teams to protect the 'gate as long as possible.

An hour later an SF stops by to tell him about a glow under the door and an empty room and Cam looks at those around him and then finds Teal'c and Carter and nobody has to ask because they all know and if Earth's best chance at the moment is a no-longer-corporeal archaeologist with an overdeveloped martyr complex who's cheated death a few too many times and either doesn't know what he's getting himself into or knows all too well, it's still a better chance than none.

Flying isn't Cam's job anymore so he stands by Landry's side and watches the little dots that are F-302's -- he recognizes far too few of the pilot's names -- and the bigger dots that are Apollo and Daedalus swarm protectively as the Ori ships reach Earth. He isn't surprised when Adria appears.

"Are you ready to bow down before the Ori?" Adria asks, all saccharin sweet.

"What did you do with Vala?" Cam asks in reply, drawing a sidearm he knows will be useless.

"Oh, don't worry. Mother is safe." Adria's smile is the scariest thing Cam's seen in months. "Soon she will understand the power of the Ori."

"We never said they weren't powerful," Landry tells her. "But they aren't gods."

Adria's eyes flash red-gold and Cam leaps forward. It's too little too late and Adria slams him against the wall with a wave of her hand. The last thing he sees before the world goes black is Landry falling to his knees.

Cam wakes slung over Teal'c's shoulder like a sack of potatoes, his whole body one giant bruise. Teal'c stops moving when he pounds his back, sets him down, holding him steady while the room spins. People are running around him, heading to supply rooms or the gateroom, too many conversations to follow. On the other side of Teal'c, Carter's fingers are a blur on the keyboard and Landry is standing over her with an icepack on his head. The dots left on the radar all belong to Ori ships.

"Sir?" Cam asks shakily. "What happened?"

"Damnedest thing," Landry mutters. "I was sure I was done for. Then she just disappeared."

"Virus is ready, sir," Sam says. "Wormhole to Atlantis should close in 5 minutes."

"Let Reynolds know we have maybe one more shot to get through everyone we can," Landry orders. "Mitchell, help me set the self-destruct."

"Sir?"

"Within the next hour this entire planet is going to be crawling with Ori soldiers. We can't let them find Atlantis. Antarctica is already destroyed. Now we need to take care of SGC," Landry explains, stepping up to an empty keyboard. Cam watches his fingers shake as he finds the keys to enter his command code, setting the self destruct to go off at Landry's mark. When he turns around there is a sonic boom and a flash of light from the gateroom and he looks back to see Jackson on the floor, stark naked with every muscle taut and limbs contorted. His eyes stare blindly at the wall, his mouth a gaping rictus. The stream of people heading for the opened 'gate has frozen in shock, milling around and giving Jackson a wide berth.

Cam is down the stairs and nearly through the door, Sam and Teal'c on his heels, when Landry's voice barks through the microphone, ordering people to get moving, damnit. Cam stops a foot from Jackson, who hasn't moved, letting the stream of people flow around the four of them. Sam pushes past and crouches down, uttering a quiet "Daniel?" as she reaches for his wrist.

The second her fingers contact his skin he opens his mouth impossibly wider and screams to wake the dead - no words, no purpose, just a never-ending inhuman cocaphony that doesn't even pause for him to draw breath. Within seconds his body starts bucking - back arching, limbs flailing - and Teal'c drops like a stone to hold Jackson's legs while Cam puts his weight across his shoulders, trying to keep him from hurting himself. It's like trying to keep hold of a wet cat, only his momma's cat never weighed more than he did and never screamed like this.

Sam's hands are everywhere, desperately trying to soothe Jackson by stroking his hair, pleading with him to calm down, telling him he's safe and then Doctor Lam appears with a sedative and within seconds Cam is back on his heels, looking bewilderedly at Sam and Teal'c, who only look old, like they've done this before. Behind them the 'gate shuts down and Cam rises, turning to ask Landry for his next orders when he feels the cold caress of an Asgard transporter.

He nearly falls when his feet materialize on the floor of the Odyssey, Sam and Teal'c and Lam and Jackson in their same positions on the floor next to him. "Is that everyone?" General O'Neill's voice asks and Cam whirls around to find him perched on the edge of the command chair, like he really doesn't want to be sitting right now.

"Sir," Sam steps forward. "General Landry..."

"Is ensuring the self destruct goes off," O'Neill finishes. "After 'gating through everyone he can. You wipe the computers?"

"Yes, sir. Nothing left about Atlantis. But, sir, shouldn't we fight?" Sam never liked a problem that had no solution.

O'Neill shakes his head. "Daedalus is barely going to make it to Pegasus with a skeleton crew. Odyssey has all she can carry and we can't lose her," he explains before barking orders to the lieutenant at the helm to engage the cloak and pull back to Earth's moon. Cam finds himself with Teal'c, carrying Jackson's unconscious body and following Doctor Lam to the infirmary.

When he gets back to the bridge he stands next to Sam and watches the Ori ships separate to space themselves evenly over Earth's landmass. When they go in for the kill, weapons firing, clearly no longer caring if there are any survivors to convert, Sam takes his hand and squeezes before looking away. Cam can't not watch as the fires blaze across the planet.

"Marks?" O'Neill's voice is like an undertaker's. "Get us out of here."


	2. Chapter 2

**August 12, 2008 (4 ASY, 1 AE (After Earth))**

The F-302 creaks ominously as Cam banks it, babying the dying engines into a course for one of the city's piers. To the left he can still see the damage the replicators did to the city right before the Earth refugees arrived. "C'mon, baby, c'mon," he mutters, gripping the stick.

"Colonel Mitchell." Teal'c's voice is strained behind him. "To your left."

Cam can just make out the Puddlejumper in the distance, leaving a trail of black smoke as it tries to evade a dart. "Is that.." he starts to ask when McKay's voice comes through the radio, loud and panicked, "Atlantis, we're going down. Anybody?"

"Oh thank god. Teal'c?" Cam asks, already pulling on the stick, coaxing anything he can out of the plane, knowing Teal'c's response before he utters it. Sheppard's team is on that jumper and if McKay is manning the radio, they aren't doing too well. Plus no way Sheppard would fly that badly, even with that much damage. Cam manages to sneak in along the dart's blindspot and use their last ammunition to blow it into the ocean before pulling up. "Teal'c, I'm not sure we're gonna make it," he says, trying to judge how far away the city is and how much fuel reserves the plane still has when it claims to be empty.

"I am confident you can bring us in," Teal'c replies. "The winds appear to be in our favor."

Cam struggles and curses and follows every one of Teal'c's suggestions and manages to glide into a half-crash onto Atlantis's pier, skidding to a screeching halt mere feet away from the still smoking jumper. The second they blow the hatch he leaps out, Teal'c right behind him, and glances at the fried control panel before trying to wedge open the jumper's back door.

The damn gene wouldn't take in either of them, so it's a fight of strength rather than the simple laying down of a palm and they finally open the door to a ship filling with smoke. McKay barrels out, quickly followed by Teyla and Ronon dragging an unconscious Sheppard. Ford is nowhere to be seen. Cam turns to find Doctor Keller with a few orderlies and several gurneys and waves her away. He can walk.

An hour later one of the nurses clears him and he walks into a storm. Sheppard is conscious and sitting up and probably wishing he wasn't because Cam has never seen General O'Neill so angry. He's standing at the foot of Sheppard's bed looking ready to spit nails. "If you ever pull a stunt like that again I will ground your ass so fast..."

Sheppard leans back, crossing his arms like a defiant teenager. "It worked, didn't it?"

"You lost Ford and damn near lost Ronon," O'Neill shouts. "On a risky mission you'd been ordered not to go on." Cam looks over to Ronon, realizing the grey streaks in his hair aren't dust like he thought earlier, and only barely manages to pull his eyes from the bloody handprint on the Satedan's chest.

"Ford knew the risks," Sheppard grumbles. "It was his plan."

"And since when is a drug-addicted adrenaline junkie a master of strategic planning? We don't have the supplies or the manpower for ill-advised suicide missions. Especially ones suggested by drug addicts who suddenly appear after three years AWOL!"

"We needed the intel," Sheppard shoots back. "And I didn't hear you suggesting any better ideas."

"Maybe because I know when something isn't worth it and it's better to cut your losses."

"Is that what happened on Earth?" Cam flinches when Sheppard utters it, seeing instant regret crossing his face. O'Neill freezes a long minute, hands clenched, before turning and stalking out of the infirmary.

"Careful. Playing with fire there," Cam says, stepping forward. "He is right you know. You guys were lucky to make it back at all."

Sheppard shrugs and leans back onto his pillows. "You don't understand what it's like in this galaxy. Sometimes you have to take risks."

Cam stares at him for a minute than shakes his head and turns to leave. This isn't his fight and it's not one he feels like having. Ronon catches his eye on his way out and gives him a brief nod. It might be approval.

Cam's halfway to the far tower before he realizes his feet are taking him there, at which point it isn't worth turning back. He hasn't been by in a few days anyway. Sam's sitting at the desk overlooking the isolation room. "How's our boy doing?" Cam asks, sliding into the chair next to her.

"About the same," Sam sighs, leaning forward to rest her elbows on the desk. The entire surface is covered with blueprints of some internal mystery of Atlantis's power grid. Cam scoots forward to peer through the glass. Daniel's sitting crosslegged on the floor, bearded and skinny - most days he ignores the food they bring him - but at least he's dressed, which puts today among the better days. He's got a marker in hand and is peering intently at the wall in front of him.

"Today's a writing day then?" Cam asks, leaning back again. "Don't suppose Weir's looked at it yet." The first time Daniel wrote on the walls they'd wheeled Weir (and wasn't it fun to evacuate Earth for an Atlantis still reeling from her own beating?) in - after Daniel she was the best they had at translating Ancient - but she'd only managed to decipher a handful of words. Whatever dialect Daniel was favoring wasn't one she'd seen before.

"Didn't seem worth it," Sam mutters, stretching in her chair. "Cam? Do you ever wonder...?"

Cam watches her stumble over words then rolls his chair behind hers and reaches out to try to work the knots out of her shoulders. She always tenses up when she leans over this desk too long. Below them, Daniel has stood up to pace back and forth. It takes him fourteen strides to cross the room and each time he passes the outside window he pauses to press his hand against the glass. All they can see through it is ocean.

"Sheppard's team made it back," Cam tells her, not wanting to push.

"I know. Teal'c stopped by," Sam says, letting her head drop down as Cam works in toward her neck. "They got pretty beat up."

"Ford's gone again. Don't think Sheppard believes it'll stick this time either. Ronon lost a few years," Cam says. It's wrong that he's starting to accept that as normal. "But they got the intel. That should help."

Sam nods, leaning back into Cam's touch. He lets his hands still, then wraps one arm loosely around her shoulders. "I'm tired," she says, eyes locked on Daniel's movements below them.

"What do I wonder?" he asks, now that she seems relaxed.

"Huh?"

"You started to ask if I ever wondered...?"

"Oh. Nothing." Sam stands up and reaches out to roll up the blueprints, which is when Daniel suddenly stops pacing and turns to stare right at them. "Cam...is he?" she asks before running out the room for the stairs.

Cam looks one more second before following her. Daniel's mouth is moving. The last year he's barely acknowledged the presence of any of them. Sometimes Teal'c can get him to eat or Sam's voice will make him turn his head or he'll lean in towards O'Neill like the General's a gravity well. But usually he's lost in some world the rest of them can't even touch. They'd pieced something together from his occasional muttering about stopping Adria before the Ancients stopped him and flung him back to his corporeal form.

Now when Cam enters the room Sam stands in front of Daniel with her hands on his shoulders and he has a death grip on her elbows. Daniel's mouth is moving, uttering one word over and over again so quiet Cam can't hear. When Cam steps closer, wincing at the claw-like grip Daniel has on Sam's elbows, he can finally make out the word. "Who?"


	3. Chapter 3

**November 17, 2009 (5 ASY, 2 AE)**

When O'Neill's hand slams onto the table Lorne jumps and Cam watches Teyla's lips press together. "We can't just keep running," the General snaps.

"If you have a better plan, I'm willing to listen." Doctor Weir's voice has enough steel to seem like she's towering over O'Neill, even though standing he has several feet on her. "But I'm not willing to risk more lives."

"We're going to lose everyone if we don't do something," O'Neill shouts.

Cam listens to the city creak as Sheppard and McKay try to pull every ounce left in the stardrive engines. If they don't find a planet soon, it's not going to matter either way.

"We've got something here," Sam calls from across the command center where she and Zelenka are inches away from the same laptop screen. Cam uses it as an excuse to remove himself from the battle of wills. "Large ocean, breathable atmosphere, no signs of habitation."

"Can we make it?" Cam asks, leaning in to peer at something dark on the screen. "What's that?"

"Looks like ruins," Zelenka mutters, typing furiously on the keyboard. "Possibly Ancient."

"Do we have enough power to reach it?"

"I think so," Sam mutters, taking one last look at the screen before standing up. "I should go help Rodney."

Cam watches the swirl of people around him, momentarily cursing his uselessness. He can't help Sheppard fly the city and he doesn't know enough engineering to be anything but in the way with McKay and Carter and he definitely doesn't feel like getting in the middle of whatever confrontation O'Neill and Weir are working toward. Luckily McKay offers him a distraction. "Um, we have a problem," the scientist's voice calls over the radio. "We aren't going to be able to sustain life support to the city during landing. You need to evacuate everyone to within twenty feet of the central tower."

Cam takes one look at Teyla and Lorne and they run off, shouting orders to anyone in a uniform they pass along the way. They keep the unused portions of the city closed off - enough kids they don't want wandering off and getting lost or discovering some Ancient weapon - so it isn't too long before they've got everyone gathered and milling around within the area around the central tower. Cam's getting things organized on one end, setting some of the older kids to organize a game to keep the younger ones from being scared and setting people he trusts to guard the doors as the city starts to shake and groan around them, when Zelenka's voice comes through the radio. "Colonel Mitchell, we have one more life sign in base of the far north tower."

Jackson. Shit. Cameron shoots a look at Teyla and runs out the door and toward the nearest lift. At a full-out sprint, using every transport device that still works, it takes him four minutes to get there. He doesn't dare ask McKay how much time he has and doesn't even bother trying the radio Jackson usually forgets to wear. When Cam bursts through the door, sucking air into his lungs, Jackson is hunched over the display that links to the Asgard database they'd managed to move in from the Odyssey. The database itself is buried in the middle of the city, as protected as they can get it, but Jackson prefers to be out here away from everyone.

"Daniel!" Cam calls, more as a way to get his attention before grabbing his arm than actually expecting Jackson to respond to his own damn name. He looks up, eyebrows somewhere between puzzlement and annoyance when Cam grabs his elbow and tugs.

"What's…Cameron?" Jackson says, then shakes his head. Cam can't resist cursing under his breath. He does not have time for Jackson to be having one of those days where he's slow to respond and slower to recognize anything around him, so he just pulls Jackson bodily across the room.

"We have got to get out of here," Cam mutters, slamming a palm on the door controls, which is when McKay's voice comes through the radio telling him they're out of time.

"Cam!" Carter calls through the radio. "Down the corridor two doors to your right - the storage area in the room is airtight. Can you get there?"

"We'll try," Cam shouts, dragging Jackson who, miracle upon miracle, comes willingly. The entire city creaks and Cam swears he can hear the damn shield pulling back but he manages to wedge through the door and shove Jackson into the room before sealing the door behind them. They sit on the floor in a tiny closet, listening to the city shudder and groan its way to landing. Jackson stares silently at the wall the entire time.

When the city settles - and Cam regrets missing the splash - and air rushes into the room Cam wedges the door open. Jackson stands and walks through, heading back to the console. "You're welcome," Cam calls. Jackson doesn't react.

Back at the control tower there's a buzz of excitement. Turns out the ruins do appear to be an Ancient lab and the scientists are thrilled - McKay positively bouncing on his toes, Carter calmly packing gear with a giant grin on her face and Zelenka extending the sensors to take enough readings to convince Weir that it's safe. Cam looks around at O'Neill's scowl, the stubborn set of Weir's eyebrows and the exhausted-looking Sheppard leaning just inside the doorway and makes his decision in an instant. "I'll escort them down there," he volunteers, because right now the scientists look like they'll be a lot more fun to be around. Not that Sam needs a bodyguard or that the others haven't learned the right way to aim a gun by now.

Four hours later he's maneuvering down what might have once been a road and can barely resist the impulse to skip, not just because it's been weeks since he's had anything but metal city under his feet. "Just like old times, huh?" he says. Because Sam is to his right, scanning their surroundings, and there are five other scientists between them and where Teal'c is covering their six. And maybe Vala is missing and on good days Jackson can almost remember his name and the stars will never be right but this is still at least part of his team exploring a new planet.

"A little bit, yeah," Sam admits, offering him a smile - much too rare these days.

When they hit the ruins Cam joins Teal'c guarding the perimeter and the scientists scatter with McKay loudly warning them not to touch anything. Cam can hear Carter rolling her eyes.

Several hours later she plops down next to him, grimy and sweaty, and reaches for his canteen. "Find anything cool?" he asks, shading his eyes against the setting sun.

"Maybe. It was definitely a lab and there's stuff McKay hasn't seen. But it's in pretty bad shape. Don't know if we'll get anything. We did find a ZPM that might have some power left." Sam shrugs and leans back against the rocks.

McKay's shout for Stewart - the best Ancient translator they have after Jackson and Weir and the fact that he's both sane and mobile making him all the more useful - makes her jump up again, Cam and Teal'c with her. By the time they reach McKay he's talking a mile a minute and turns on them with bright eyes.

"It was a research post - the last ditch attempt to stop the Wraith and it looks like they almost succeeded before they lost which means there might be something here we can use," he explains.

"Well that's good," Cam says, leaning against a nearby boulder.

"No, that's not the good news," McKay announces.

"Then what is?"

"That." McKay points to a piece of equipment that looks remarkably unbroken. "Makes ZPMs."


	4. Chapter 4

**September 3, 2010 (6 ASY, 3 AE)**

"And so," McKay ends his part of the debrief. "We can destroy the Wraith."

Next to him, Carter levels her head, looking straight at O'Neill. "Assuming we choose to do so."

"Why wouldn't we?" Sheppard drawls next to Cam. "Finally take them out with minimal risk? I'm not seeing the problem."

"It's genocide," Cam says quietly, running a finger along the table. "Or, xenocide, I guess." Three years in this galaxy and he still doesn't feel like he really has a right to an opinion about the Wraith. He didn't grow up under them like Teyla and Ronon, wasn't there when Sheppard woke them up hungry.

"The Wraith have killed humans in this galaxy for generations and will continue to do so," Teyla points out at the other end of the table. "It is in their nature. They cannot exist and not be a threat."

"Exactly," General O'Neill agrees, as though it were a done deal, "why we have to do it."

"This is why I let Carson try his experiments on modifying Wraith DNA," Weir explains. "So it wouldn't come to this."

"Worked out well for you, did it?" O'Neill asks sarcastically.

"That's not the point," Weir sighs, leaning back in her chair. "The point is that doing this makes us no better than them."

"No." O'Neill's voice goes deadly quiet. "It makes us worse." Several heads raise, turning to look at the General with puzzled faces. "The Wraith need us to survive. They'd never kill off humans entirely, or they'd be dooming themselves. It's no different than a coyote hunting a rabbit for food. We're just killing them."

"By that analogy," Sheppard counters, "there's also nothing that says the rabbit can't fight back. Elizabeth, I don't think we can afford to not do this."

Weir pushes her chair back from the table and nods before wheeling out of the room. She pauses in the doorway. "Do it. But that doesn't mean I have to like it."

A half hour later Cam leaves the room - it's all over but for McKay and Carter arguing the best delivery method, and he needs fresh air. He finds Weir out on the balcony.

"You know," she says, not turning to look at him. "When President Hayes told me about the Stargate program and asked me to command SGC, he told me he wanted my skills at negotiating. That my anti-weapon stance was a strength." Her laugh is hollow. "Now look at me annihilating an entire sentient species."

"The way I see it, when it's kill or be killed, there's nothing wrong with choosing to be on the side that survives," Cam answers. "It's not like we all don't already have blood on our hands."

"Just once I'd like us to find another way," she says, giving him a small smile.

"So would I." When she doesn't respond he leaves her to make peace with the ocean.

Six weeks later, Cameron's in the cockpit of a Wraith dart, and everything feels wrong. None of the controls work how they should, and everything is designed for a body that isn't human. But McKay wrote an interface and Sheppard drilled them on how to fly it. He's committed to the mission, and he'll get them there and get them home, and if it's some weird mix of trying to fly his momma's washing machine and driving the fastest car in the Indy 500 but really nothing like either, he's got nobody to listen to him complain.

Scattered across the galaxy are three other darts just like his, each with a two-person team (one muscle, one brain) in the matter storage unit, ready to hit four separate hives with the fast-spreading virus all at once in hopes that it will transfer along the mental network faster than it can be detected and stopped. Just as he releases Sam and Teal'c onto the platform, wearing the handy little short-term personal cloaks they're hoping to hell will work, he knows three other darts are doing the same. Sheppard's got Ronon and McKay, Lorne is carrying Reynolds and Zelenka and O'Neill's dart has Stewart and Marks; and if they all make it back there's gonna be one hell of a party on Atlantis tonight.

Cam circles the landing bay, hairs on the back of his neck rising at the never-ending mosquito whine of the engines. Next time he's gonna insist McKay install a clear cockpit, even though part of him is glad not to see the dark alien mixture of living machine that makes up the inside of a hive. He's only been inside one a bare handful of times and would have been happy if each one had been his last. Hopefully it really will be, this time.

Carter's call for pick up comes just before he's ready to start worrying, and he swoops down, activates the culling beam, and watches the blips of their locators disappear, hoping to god he's got them, before high-tailing it out of there. Eight hours later, he's never been so glad to see Atlantis, and he starts really breathing again when Carter and Teal'c appear on the landing bay in front of him before he leaps out of the dart, never wanting to get inside again.

O'Neill and Lorne are already back. Within minutes, Chuck runs in with reports of Wraith Hives crashing and going dark all over the map. Cam's never seen a virus act so fast before, but then he's never seen one travel on telepathic pathways. The makeshift hanger is filled with a cacophony of celebration and Carter actually laughs when Cam picks her up and spins around. Teyla stands by the doorway, unable to go on the mission for fear the latent Wraith psychic abilities could have endangered her or the mission. She smiles at the celebration, but everybody knows she won't relax until her team gets back.

Ten minutes later Sheppard's dart comes in trailing black smoke and listing to the side. Cam winces as it clangs to a crash landing on the other side of the hanger. He hears the whine of the materialization ray and Sheppard's shout and looks over to find Teyla go ashen, leaning against the wall in a slow collapse to the floor.

By the time Cam gets there, Sam and Teal'c right behind him, there's a mob of people and Sheppard is shouting and Rodney can't stand up and as the medics roll him away Cam can hear him say something about a Wraith stunner and Ronon sacrificing himself and that's when he realizes there's no Satedan with greying dreadlocks towering over them.

"Doctor Keller said he didn't have much time anyway, with the feeding," he hears Teyla saying to Sheppard. "At least he took the Wraith with him." Cam watches the remnants of their team cling to each other and everyone else flow around them and knows that there's nothing to say that wouldn't feel hollow.


	5. Chapter 5

**December 15, 2011 (7 ASY, 4 AE)**

 

"Caldwell's leaving," Cam says. "He's taking the Daedalus back home to see if anything's left."

Sheppard grunts from where the therapist is trying to encourage him to walk a straight line. "Weir and O'Neill are okay with that?"

Cam shrugs. "We've got the Odyssey, and he made a compelling argument - hasn't been any serious conflict since the Wraith."

The sound that comes from Sheppard is half-laugh, half-cough as he slumps against the parallel bars. "Right," he mutters, which is when Cam realizes maybe he isn't bringing up the best topic. They'd all feared the worst when Reynolds and Lorne came back with a bloody, un-moving Sheppard on a stretcher, and that it was a random conflict between villages didn't make Sheppard's injuries any less grave, even if it made everyone breathe a sigh of relief that it wasn't a sign of danger speeding for Atlantis.

When Sheppard doesn't move Cam gets up from his seat. "C'mon, one more lap," he encourages, close to the bars.

Sheppard starts to stand straight, then shakes his head and slumps back, barely catching himself. Cam lets him rest a minute before putting his hand next to Sheppard's. "You've got to want this." Cam's been there, so when Sheppard was refusing therapy, refusing hope, it was Cam who talked him out of bed, talked him into trying, one step at a time. "You're the only person who can make sure you walk again."

The laugh that comes from Sheppard is hollow and defeated but he straightens up, locks his jaw, and takes two more steps before turning and making it to the other end. Cam helps him maneuver into the wheelchair, silently grateful he's not sitting in it.

"Anyone ever tell you you're a slave driver?" Sheppard mutters as he levers himself into bed.

"Yeah, well, I'm not gonna let you sit on your ass playing video games while we run around the galaxy risking our hides," Cam tells him. "See you later?" He leaves at Sheppard's nod, knows how exhausted he probably is right now.

That night Cam sits down to dinner with Teal'c and General O'Neill across from him and Sam next to him, trying to coax Daniel into remembering to eat something. Team dinners are hollow these days compared to what they once were, but then so's the team and Cam'll take whatever he can get.

Ten minutes in, Teal'c puts his fork down on a half-empty plate, looks at them all for a second and announces, "I will be accompanying Colonel Caldwell on his mission."

Cam's opening his mouth to protest, somehow convince Teal'c he can't leave them, but General O'Neill beats him to it. "You know, T, I think we need you here a lot more than Caldwell needs you."

"Atlantis has been safe for some time," Teal'c points out. "And I must see how the Jaffa are fairing, lend my brothers help where I can."

"We'll miss you," Sam says into her not-quite potatoes, no longer focusing on Daniel. "But we understand."

"I do not intend good-bye to be forever," Teal'c pointed out. "But I cannot abandon my own people."

Cam nods around the food that's made a lump in his throat. His team is never going to stop unraveling, and he can't do anything about it.

The Daedalus leaves three days later. Teal'c hugs them all. Sam doesn't pretend to hide the tears and Cam doesn't make Teal'c promise to return, but he does make him promise to try. They get two more days of peace before Cam wakes up in the process of falling out of bed with alarms screaming and the entire city shaking.

He has his feet shoved into boots (haven't been attacked in a while, still keeps them ready by the side of his bed), tac vest on (over pajamas), sidearm in hand and he's through his door before he even wakes up. "This is Mitchell," he says, thumbing his radio after fumbling it onto his ear. "What's happening?"

"Replicators came out of nowhere," Lorne's voice answers him.

"Mitchell, are you near an armory?" O'Neill's voice cuts through.

Cam quickly reviews his mental map of the city. "Not close sir, but I can get there." Another blast rips through somewhere, and Cam staggers into a wall as the entire city shakes.

"That was the science labs," somebody shouts over the radio and before Mitchell can respond or ask O'Neill for orders the entire thing goes dead. He heads for the armory, hoping to at least learn more about the situation when he gets there.

When he runs past the infirmary someone shouts "Mitchell" through the doorway, draws him up hard. Sheppard's sitting up in bed (as much as he can) and beckoning him over. "Get me to the Control Chair."

"Sheppard, I don't have time for this," Cam starts to protest.

"Look, I can't fly, and I can't fight them off, but but if I'm gonna sit on my ass while you run around risking your hides, I'd rather do that where I can make a difference," Sheppard snaps and Cam knows that hopeless feeling and he's getting Sheppard into a wheelchair before he even decides to.

They use up what Cam is sure must be their last bit of luck in the clear path to the control room and Cam is getting Sheppard into the Chair when the radio kicks back in and there is screaming and calls for backup in the science labs and Sam is there and McKay is there and Sheppard takes one look at him and says "go."

Cam's out the door, full-speed, as he hears the Chair whine into life, halfway to the science labs before he thinks to wonder how many drones they have left. The smell of smoke hits him long before he runs smack into the devastation and the big, giant hole in the wall showing just how far down the ocean is. A figure emerges from the smoke, resolves into Sam (bandana around her mouth) dragging an unconscious McKay

She points forward and, as the city shakes again, he covers his mouth and walks into hell, helping direct the stream of scientists Sam has lead out of chaos. By the time they're out, everything's gone quiet. O'Neill's voice comes through the radio giving the all clear. For now.

Cam collapses on the floor next to Sam, leaning slightly into her shoulder. "I'm getting too old for this," he mutters, letting his head fall against the wall and closing his eyes.

Her laugh quickly degenerates into a coughing fit, but it's worth it. Been a long time since he heard it.


	6. Chapter 6

**January 2, 2013 (8 ASY, 6 AE)**

 

Cam stumbles into one of the sleeping rooms they've set up (conserving power means closing down any non-essential areas of Atlantis which means no private rooms) and falls onto the first empty mat he finds. He's wearing the dirt from five different planets, somebody's blood is on his sleeve, and he's too tired to even bother taking his shoes off.

Lorne gives him four hours of blessed unconsciousness before shaking him awake. "Sir, the general wants you."

"Tell him I'm dead," Cam mutters, turning over.

"I'm sure he'd say he could arrange it," Lorne replies, pushing his shoulder until he turns back over. "C'mon. Michelson's got a new fake-coffee brewing. You wouldn't want to miss out on first taste."

Cam groans and stands up, wincing at the ache in his hip. Sleeping (the few hours he manages to grab) on a hard surface isn't doing anything to prevent the slow deterioration of a body that was always only mobile on borrowed time.

By the time he gets into the gateroom he's got the limp mostly worked out and someone shoves a hot mug of something into his hands. He's downed two mouthfuls (tastes slightly less like his sister's mud pies than the last batch did) when he realizes it was Jackson doing the shoving. He nearly drops the mug.

"Jackson?" he asks incredulously. Jackson's hardly ever come out of his hidey-hole on his own, and none of them have had time lately to drag him out.

Jackson shrugs and turns away the second Cam makes eye contact, tapping some random pattern that must be important to him on the still-full mug he's holding in his own hands. Cam shoots a questioning look at Lorne who shrugs and takes a sip from his own not-coffee.

"Here's the assignments for today," Campbell passes the sheets out to various team leaders, letting them know which godforsaken planet they'll be visiting today in a desperate attempt to find some way to survive and hold off the replicators a bit longer. The room is silent, has been in the "morning" for a while. Same thing they do every day.

"Can't keep running." The voice comes, unexpected, from somewhere to Cam's left and he swears it was Jackson but when he looks up the man is still intent on tapping patterns on the bottom of his coffee mug. "They'll always find you." And now Cam is sure it's Jackson and hell if this isn't creepy.

"Do you have a better idea?" O'Neill's question is sharp. He's been sleeping less than any of them.

"Answer's there." Jackson points to a terminal that hooks into both the Atlantis database and the Asgard mainframe, then shrugs and walks away

"Okay, that was weird," Cam says. McKay is already making a beeline for the terminal but Sam beats him there and within seconds they're both typing furiously, scanning the screen, and the whole room is watching them in silence.

Cam realizes a minute later that they're all waiting for McKay and Carter and Jackson (in absentia) to pull a rabbit out of their combined hats, find some miracle genius solution to all their myriad problems, just like old times. But these days it's longer and longer between genius solutions.

"Alright, show's over," O'Neill announces and Cam watches the heads slowly swivel back to him. "You've got assignments, first team sets out in thirty minutes."

Cam looks down at his paper. He's heading out with Lorne, Ramirez, and Stockton today. It's a milk run to a peaceful agricultural planet they've traded with before and at least he'll have sunlight and grass under his feet for a few hours. "Sir?" Sam's voice calls from the terminal and Cam can't help joining the others in looking up hopefully (Pavlov's dogs, the whole lot of 'em) but she's only looking at General O'Neill.

"Right. McKay and Carter are sitting this one out," O'Neill says, shaking his head and stepping down. "Rest of you suit up."

Cam's got two more hours until it's morning on the farming planet, which isn't really enough time to make more sleep worth anything but stiffening up his hip. He ends up climbing the tower to watch the stars out the window (been a long time since Atlantis was on a planet. Staying in one place is too risky).

He must have dozed off against the wall (never forget what you learned in Basic) because the voice makes him jump. "They'll find it." When he opens his eyes Jackson's standing two feet to his left, body angled slightly towards him.

"Find what?" Cam asks in frustration.

Daniel shrugs then leans forward to breathe on the glass in front of him, fogging it up. He reaches forward with a finger, sketches in the fog, then walks away. Cam watches him disappear then leans over to read it. _the answer_ is scribbled in Jackson's unforgettable scrawl and Cam stares at it a minute before wiping it away with his sleeve. "Think I liked it better when you weren't talking," he muttered down the hallway Jackson had disappeared into.

The shout from below has him running anyway. When he hits the gateroom the chaos tells him it's not Carter and McKay with a brilliant solution, but another attack. "Two ships," Lorne shouts, throwing an improved ARG at him on his way to the puddlejumper bay (all personnel with the gene are on their way into the air and Cam has to stay back and watch them every time).

"It's only been six days," Cam shouts at Reynolds as he runs for the rail gun controls. "They're early."

"Maybe they missed you," Reynolds shoots back as the city shakes from the first hit.

"Did anyone get Sheppard to the chair yet?" O'Neill's voice asks over the radio, open to all frequencies. Cam checks the viewer, lining up a target and typing in the command to ready the gun, just waiting for the ships to get a little bit closer.

"I'm here," Sheppard drawls through the radio. "But you don't want to know how many drones are left."

Cam sighs and swings around to cover the launching puddlejumpers. If Carter and McKay don't figure out what Jackson meant soon, it's not going to matter much longer.


	7. Chapter 7

**March 5, 2014 (9 ASY, 7 AE)**

 

Cam blinks furiously, fighting off the concussion that's trying to drag him into unconsciousness, as the world explodes around him. The raid on the Replicator's homeworld was supposed to be a sure thing, the intel looked solid, which is probably why he shouldn't be surprised it's all shot to hell.

He's still in the puddlejumper Lorne dragged him into before running off, and he flails around, grabbing one of the seats to pull himself upright, when there's a commotion at the door. By the time he manages to get his gun pointed in the right direction, the movement focuses into General O'Neill carrying Sam, half her face covered in blood and her right arm flopping at an awkward angle at her side.

"Take care of her, Mitchell," the General orders after carefully setting her down and turning back to the door.

"Sir," Sam grunts, painfully pushing herself up. "You can't."

"I'm sick and tired of these metal bastards. This ends here and now," O'Neill snaps back, stepping out into hell and closing the hatch behind him.

Cam dazedly watches Sam struggle to get up, realizes he should be a gentleman and help her, and manages to hold the world steady enough to get to her side by the time she's stumbled to her feet. She lunges forward, clawing and pounding at the hatch.

"He locked it," she shouts when Cam joins her. "Bastard!" she shouts through the radio. "You can't leave us!" Cam watches her claw with one hand at the door, at the control panel, listens to the chatter on the radio - Lorne and Teyla and Schwartz and Reynolds and Solinski, and O'Neill giving everyone orders - and then there's a deafening explosion that has Sam staggering into him and them both landing on the floor.

He's blinking into the silence when the door opens and Lorne is standing there, ashen-faced and old-looking and behind him everything is silent. "He did it," Lorne says, gun hanging limply in his hand.

Sam goes dead in his arms and it takes a minute before he realizes she's shaking, and he holds her tight, mindful of her injured arm, and lets her sob as Lorne takes them home.

There's no body to inter at the makeshift cemetery on pier five, but even if there was General O'Neill would have wanted to be left on a planet where he could feel the soil and wind and rain. He'd been raised Minnesota Lutheran, claimed he'd stopped believing in god long before he got a job killing false ones (that saying about atheists and foxholes might be true, but O'Neill rarely had the protection of an actual foxhole) so the Unitarian minister (one of four chaplains they'd evacuated through the 'gate) officiates at the funeral and if it's not exactly the funeral the General would have chosen, they're more for survivors anyway.

Cam stands as close to Sam as he dares, three feet to her left and just behind so he can barely see the pattern of cuts on bruises covering the side of her face, the arm in the sling. She stands in perfect military parade rest, long-familiar position and Carter stubbornness the only things keeping her upright. With Daniel broken, Teal'c missing, and now O'Neill dead, she's all that remains of the original SG-1 -- that holy fraternity of broken heroes (Cam can still remember when he only saw the hero part -- couldn't fathom Jackson's flippancy, Carter's willingness to let it go, Teal'c's desire to move on). Every person there knows to give her space.

The twenty-one gun salute is a waste of precious bullets nobody questions, and Cam watches her flinch through each volley, concussive sound ricocheting through his bones. In the corner of his eye, Daniel sways to some unknown rhythm and picks at his sleeve until Cam wants to grab his shoulders, shake him, look him in the eye and force him to understand what's happening. When the mountains have absorbed the final echoes of gunfire, Carter steps to the edge of the stream and releases the green, well-worn baseball cap from her hand.

As she's turning back, Reynolds steps forward holding a flag pieced together from scraps of fabric with the Earth's point of origin prominently displayed in the middle and several other Marines step up to help him fold it. When it's a tight triangle he turns and presents it to Carter, perfect military precision, and tells her, "So the General can always find his way home."

That's when Sam collapses, clutching the flag to her chest and falling gracelessly to the ground. Before Cam can take a step, Daniel is by her side, arms wrapping around her as he lowers her down so she can bury her face in his shoulder, clinging to him as though he's all she has. Cam stands rooted to the spot, torn between the urge to comfort his teammate(s) and the feeling that it isn't his place to barge into somewhere he doesn't belong.

The hand on his elbow stops him just as he decides to go forward, and he turns to find Teyla, eyes sadder and older than when he first met her. "Let them mourn," she says quietly, leading him away. "Later they will need your strength."

He follows her as she winds through the sparse forest, stopping at the edge of a short cliff. "Your people do not accept death," she says, not looking back at him. "Living under the Wraith, a life as long and accomplished as General O'Neill's would have been celebrated."

"We can celebrate his life and still mourn that he left us too soon," Cam points out.

"General O'Neill chose to leave on his own terms, sacrificing himself to save many he cared about." Teyla sighs. "It is an honorable end."

"Doesn't make it any easier to accept that he's gone."

Teyla turns to face him. Cam thinks he can see the ghosts of her own team in her weariness, all those she's lost over the years. "No. It does not."


	8. Chapter 8

**March 5, 2015 (10 ASY, 8 AE)**

 

Cam likes Atlantis at night. When he can't sleep he can wander the corridors without interruption, without anyone needing this or that, and he can close his eyes and almost, just barely, if he ignores that the echoes are all wrong, pretend he's back at SGC, that he's geared up and going to meet his team in the gateroom for another adventure.

Tonight his feet take him to the hallway outside pier five -- the one they've turned into a makeshift memorial with photos and names plastering the walls, everything and everyone their ragtag group of survivors doesn't want to forget. He keeps getting drawn to one spot, two-thirds of the way down, where someone posted a picture of the hills of North Carolina.

He's staring at the sky, tracing the hills with his finger when there's a voice in his ear and he realizes Weir's on the radio. "Colonel Mitchell, come in," she's calling from somewhere far away.

"Yeah, I'm here," he mutters after thumbing it on.

"Cam, you were supposed to be at this meeting fifteen minutes ago," Elizabeth's voice tells him.

His watch says 0815, which means he left his quarters six hours ago but that doesn't make sense, hasn't been that long. He shakes his head and thumbs the radio, "I'll be there in less than five," he tells her before realizing he's wearing a t-shirt, sweat pants, and untied boots. One extra minute to change wont matter.

When he gets to the meeting room everyone's head swivels to him. "Cameron, I called you twenty minutes ago," Elizabeth says. "Is everything okay?"

"Sorry," Cam says, shrugging and dropping into a chair near the back. Around him people talk about setting up a school and a system of government and how to deal with refugees and he sits back, notices that Carter's hair is getting longer, Sheppard doesn't have his cane today, McKay seems unusually quiet.

When there's a hand in front of his face he looks up to see Sam standing and an empty room behind her. "C'mon, let's get lunch," she offers.

They swing by to pick up Daniel and soon Cam has a tray of food in front of him and he's watching Daniel poke his fork at a plate of alien vegetables. "It's weird," Sam is saying, "but in a way I'm more tired now. Like I'm trying to catch up on the sleep I lost running nonstop the last sixteen years."

Daniel has his plate divided now, bread on the left, green vegetables on top, yellow on the bottom, and something white that isn't mashed potatoes on the right. He's using his fork to write something into the mashed not-potatoes. "Won't you just eat it already?" Cam snaps, surprising himself. Just once he wants eating with Daniel to be normal again.

"Cameron?" Sam's voice sounds worried but Cam only watches Daniel's fork drop to his plate.

"Tell me about King Arthur," Cam demands. "Tell me about Merlin. Why did you know the pyramids weren't built when people thought they were? How did Goa'uld social structure parallel with the human mythologies they're related to? What was it like to die?" Daniel's sitting there, hands below the table, looking at his food. "Look at me! Answer me! Babble about something I only vaguely care about!" There's a tug at his elbow. Cam shakes it off, stands up, leans forward. "Be Daniel Jackson, damn you!"

He backs away, knocks his chair over, sees people looking at him, Daniel looking down, Sam looking shocked and he just…runs. Out the door, down the hallway, twisting and turning, levering open doors and going deeper and deeper until his lungs are burning and at least he's feeling something.

Sam finds him later, back against the wall, seat of his pants getting damp from where the ocean seeps into the wall seam, and hip throbbing to beat the band. She hands him one of the mugs of tea in her hands then settles down next to him, pressing against him hip and shoulder.

"Do you want to talk about it?" she asks finally, words echoing in the unused hallway.

He thinks about it. Doesn't think about it. "No," he says finally.

Sam takes a sip of her tea and keeps staring straight ahead, waiting. "It's all gone," she says at last. "They took Earth, took our home, our family, everything that was familiar, that we believed in, that we swore an oath to protect."

His hands are shaking, nearly splashing the tea over the rim of the mug. "It isn't fair, none of it. Not what you sacrificed in Antarctica, not how hard you worked to get on SG-1 only to lose that. And it isn't fair that you've been running ragged for six years, holding us together and trying to stay alive." She pauses, glances at him, takes a sip of tea.

"And it isn't fair that now you have time to think about everything." Her words echo off the walls, through his ears, and the mug is flying through the air to smash against the opposite wall before he realizes he threw it. "You're not supposed to survive the end of your world."

Cam sits staring into the gloom, trying to ignore the voice inside that's telling him she's right. "You're gonna have to replace that mug, you know," Sam says, randomly and he looks over to see the corner of her mouth curving up just slightly and suddenly he's laughing, which sets her off and, really, there's no reason for it beyond the sheer absurdity of life, but it feels good.

When they quiet, there's shuffling footsteps coming down the hallway and Daniel appears around the bend, carrying three slices of pie. He stops a few feet away, looking at some point above Cam's head, and then bends over to set the slices on the floor so he can shove his hands in his pockets. "For Jack," he says, tipping his chin and using a toe to push two of the plates forward.

There are a lot of things Cam's learned since he joined SG-1. Holographic swords can still hurt like hell. Eat breakfast before you go out of phase. No matter how convincing the evidence, Daniel Jackson probably isn't dead. Teal'c probably isn't either (please let that still be true).

You do this job long enough and it'll drive you crazy.

And when all that's left to do is sit in a leaking, grimy hallway of an Ancient city and eat pie with your remaining teammates in memory of a dead hero, that's what you do. Even if you're starting to suspect that of the three of you, the crazy one might be the most sane.


	9. Chapter 9

**June 3, 2016 (11 ASY, 9 AE)**

 

Cam jolts awake and stares wildly into the darkness, trying to find what woke him, when he sees the small figure in his doorway, maybe three feet tall, backlit by the hallway. The kid watches him a minute, then seems to come to some conclusion and steps through the door, dragging pillow and blanket to the corner furthest from Cam's bed and curling up on the floor. When Cam wakes up in the morning, the kid is gone.

Cam's sworn an oath to support and defend and he's given more than he ever knew he had but this effort of starting from scratch and creating a society and a government and some sort of social structure out of the chaos created by seven years running is out of his league. So he leaves the job to Weir and the anthropologists and sociologists and people with political science degrees and, really, at this point, anyone who has an idea. The last few years have been aimless.

He spends the morning helping the botanists, learned enough in his momma's garden to be of use transplanting seedlings, and the afternoon helping Teyla on a brief trading mission. Sure enough, three hours after his lights are out a small figure appears, watches him, and curls up in the corner.

It's not that unusual. The odd sort of society they've developed mostly by accident out of some combination of psuedo-family units isn't normal by Earth standards, but the Wraith long ago assured the Pegasus Galaxy was no stranger to unusual social structures. Some of the kids running around the city still remember Earth (most of those that do are teenagers and adults now). Some of them are children of the expedition and the refugees, some orphans picked up from around the galaxy. Some of the kids have two parents, some have none, and mostly they're being raised as a collective with every adult acting as surrogate parent. Cam just hasn't had much time to find his role in all of it.

The next night he scrounges up a sleeping mat and leaves it in the corner along with a cookie from the mess. When he wakes the kid is sitting cross-legged on the mat, nibbling the cookie, and watching him.

"You got a name?" Cam asks.

The boy watches him, chewing thoughtfully, then stands up and leaves. His pillow and blanket stay behind.

That afternoon Cam wanders over to the makeshift school they've jerry-rigged (all these things someone else developed while he was trying to keep everyone alive). The younger kids are busy with some art project and he finds the boy -- looks maybe nine or ten -- apart from the others, spending some quality time in the corner with a jar of red paint.

This time the kid arrives while Cam is still brushing his teeth, goes right to the corner and finds a jar of red play-dough next to another cookie. He watches as Cam crosses the room and sits on his own bed. "Been a long time since I told a bedtime story," Cam says. "See if I can remember."

He's two-thirds of the way through Rumpelstiltskin when the kid's eyes close and don't re-open. In the morning his room is empty but there's half a cookie next to Cam's pillow.

"So I seem to have picked up a new team member," he tells Sam at lunch.

"Oh?" she says, raising an eyebrow. They haven't really been a team in a long time, but she usually doesn't remind him.

"One of the boys decided my room was a good place to sleep," Cam says, shrugging. "Not sure where he's from. Doesn't say much."

"I think Lorne's team brought back some refugees. You should find out."

He tracks down the woman who's been teaching the younger kids. "Oh, him?" she says, scrubbing a handful of paintbrushes. "Yeah, Major Lorne's team found him a few weeks ago. Hasn't told us anything yet." Cam vaguely remembers the report now about the group of kids who'd apparently been living alone on that planet for some time.

After a week of cookies and bedtime stories Cam wakes one night to a small body crawling into his bed, curling up on the edge of it. He pretends not to notice. Five days later he gets the briefest of morning hugs before the kid disappears again, and the next week, midway through a game of Chutes and Ladders, he gets a name.

"So, Mat," he says before the kid escapes out his door that morning. "I've got an important expedition today, and I could use some help. What to join me?" The kid freezes in the doorway for a minute, then turns around and nods. Cam's secretly just as grateful to have company.

He swings by the science labs, introduces Mat to Sam (kid doesn't lessen the death grip on his hand the entire time) and picks up the scanner Sam wanted him to use on the parts of Atlantis she thinks they can make usable again. He sticks to the safer areas, keeping up a running prattle.

"So I take one look at what we've gotten ourselves into, my cousin Al already running the other direction, and I realize I don't have to outrun the goat, I just have to outrun Al, and I start charging ahead. Course we both forgot about the mud puddle we'd avoided earlier and, let me tell you, by the time we got home there was so much mud you couldn't tell which of us was which."

Somewhere in there he earns a laugh. By the time they break for lunch, Mat is smiling.

"I think I'm getting somewhere," Cam tells Sam at dinner. Daniel's across from Cam and Cam doesn't care that his plate has been carefully sorted and partitioned. Every so often these days, Daniel will, not looking up, tell them something he learned from the Asgard mainframe or the Ancient database and for a minute it's like the old days again. But usually he's a silent presence, and Cam is learning to appreciate that just as much.

The next day he stops by the school and Mat's sitting at a table with a few other kids, working on a math puzzle. The teacher comes over when she sees him. "First time I've seen him not work alone," she says. "Thanks."

"I'm not really doing anything." Cam shrugs.

Two weeks later Mat stops showing up every night and eventually the sleeping pad lies empty a whole week. Cam knows he's found a space in the dormitories they've set up for the kids. He still brings a cookie home each night. Every so often someone shows up to eat it.


	10. Chapter 10

**October 26, 2017 (12 ASY, 10 AE)**

 

Cam looks up from his tea (they still haven't found a good coffee substitute and he gave up trying them when they stopped running for their lives). The sound of a stampede is coming down the hallway. He flattens himself against the wall before the herd of kids turns the corner to charge past him. Lorne brings up the rear, one small girl clinging to his back and Cam holds his hand out to so the kids can jump and give him high-fives as they run past.

"Gym class?" he asks a puffing Lorne.

"Yes, sir," Lorne says, stopping for a minute to let the girl slide to the floor. "Hoping they can burn off enough energy to sit still through history." The girl gives Cam a tight hug around his knee and runs off to join the lingering kids.

"How's your book coming?" Cam asks. Weir (Sheppard has been trying to get them all to call her Professor X ever since McKay made her the motorized wheelchair, but Cam's pretty sure his gramma will haunt him from beyond the grave if he joins in) has them all writing everything they can remember about Earth -- history they remember, people they knew, stories they can tell without flinching.

"Slowly," Cam admits. There's just so many more interesting, more important things to do than sit down in front of a keyboard, even if he understands the importance of preserving whatever they can, however hard it is to think about. "Wish the Ancients had left some device to just download our brains so we wouldn't have to write it."

Lorne laughs. "Only if we can edit what gets downloaded."

"Yeah, wouldn't want kids a hundred years from now reading about me and Susie in my uncle's pickup truck after prom," Cam admits, smiling into his mug. At the tug on his pants he looks down to see a little boy attempting to stealthily reach into his cargo pocket. The right one habitually contains some wrapped candies for just this purpose, so Cam carefully pretends not to notice the way the fabric pulls across his knee.

Cam finds Mat in the middle of the pack of kids, tossing a ball around with some of the others and exchanges the briefest of thumbs up with him. Weir managed to set up a shaky sort of governmental council that seems to be doing the job, for now but they never did develop anything better than the communal sort of child-raising that came about more or less organically. At least it seems to be working.

"Mitchell!" Sheppard's voice calls from down the hallway. Cam nods farewell to Lorne before heading his way. Sheppard is leaning heavily on his cane, which means this isn't a good day, but Cam could have guessed that from the way his own back and legs ached this morning. The doctors had been amazed at his recovery after Antarctica, but had warned the injuries would come back to haunt him as the years passed. Someday he'll have to talk to Doctor Lam about it, but he isn't ready yet.

"Morning," Cam greets, slowing his stride slightly. He knows how to move around men who don't want to remember they aren't able-bodied anymore.

"Carter sent me to fetch you," Sheppard tells him, setting an even, slow pace away from the dining area. "Has something to show you."

"What is it?"

"You'll see." Cam can't see his face, but he can hear the smirk in the man's voice. He follows him out to one of the undamaged piers, blinking in the early morning sunlight, and stops dead.

The object on the pier in front of him is obviously pieced together -- metal of different colors and sizes and a hodge-podge welding job -- but it has two wings and a tail and a windshield and is definitely plane-shaped and the way the light glints off the hull makes it look like the most beautiful thing Cam has ever seen.

"You guys made a plane?" he asks quietly, words almost choking in his throat. Sam slides out from underneath it, a wrench in her hand and grease in her hair and Zelenka pokes his head from around the nose to push up his taped-together glasses and all Cam can do is step forward to reach out and touch it, to feel if it's real.

"We know you've missed flying," Sam says, walking over to put her hand on the wing next to his. The metal is warm under his palm. "Zelenka thought it would be a good engineering challenge now that…" Cam can hear all the names she isn't saying before she gives up trying to end the sentence.

Cam strokes his hand along the wing, letting the pads of his fingers catch at the seams and flow over smooth edges. It won't do anything fancy and when he looks inside the cockpit all he finds is one seat and even fewer controls than the Cessna his daddy bought him lessons on when he was fifteen, but Sam says she'll fly and he can almost feel how right the aerodynamics are.

The loud whoop he lets out makes Zelenka jump, and Sam offers a startled "whoa" when he picks her up, spins her around, and plants a kiss right on her mouth. "I guess this means you're willing to test it," she says, opening the door and giving him a hand inside. "Just be careful, and don't go far. We think you have enough room to land."

Cam's fingers find all the right switches, as though it hasn't been too many years since they lost the last 302, too many years since he's been up in anything but a puddlejumper that won't listen to his non-Ancient blood. The plane rattles for a minute as the propellers find the right pace and there's a moment where he isn't quite sure he's gonna get off the pier but then the wings catch and he's lifting up.

He gains enough altitude to circle the city, sees the holes and scorch marks and missing towers they're never going to be able to repair but what's left still shines in the sunlight and inside there's people trying to put together some a functioning society, building community and family out of ruin. Circling around, getting a feel for the plane (and Sam and Zelenka turned out one sweet piece of engineering) Cam can hear his gramma saying home is what you make it. It'll do.


End file.
